Golf courses and washing machines: obstacles and opportunities for sustainable water management

Rising standards of living often boost demand for water-intensive goods and services. Only by managing water consumption — using measures such as water pricing and incentives to adopt new technologies — can we ensure sustainable public water access alongside economic growth.

With 19 golf courses already and another 55 planned, Spain's Júcar
River Basin offers the enthusiastic golfer a wealth of options.
Unfortunately, good news for golfers can translate into a headache for
water-resource managers. Put simply, the Júcar's courses devour huge
amounts of water — typically 500 000 m3 annually for a
single course. The accompanying influx of tourists demanding catering,
showers and swimming pools inevitably puts an even greater strain on
public
water supplies — often at the times of year when resources are most
scarce. In the context of the steadily drier summers brought on by
global warming, the risks to water supplies and human wellbeing are
potentially high.

At first sight, the obvious way to promote sustainable water use in
the Júcar River Basin is to ban further development of golf courses.
But matters are not that simple. Although a verdant golf course might
look out of place in arid Mediterranean regions, it uses no more water
than a comparable area of irrigated corn and yields a much better
financial return. Turnover at the Júcar's courses is estimated at
EUR 1.5–9 million annually and each has an average of 150
employees. With tourist numbers growing steadily, the arguments for
turning farmland into golf courses can therefore appear quite
compelling.

Complex drivers of public water use

Efforts to manage public water supplies sustainably face similar
challenges and contradictions across Europe. As a recent EEA report 'Water resources
across Europe – confronting water scarcity and drought' shows,
economic and demographic changes can expand or diminish demand for
water, sometimes in unexpected ways. And because access to water is
closely linked to economic, social and environmental wellbeing, seeking
to promote one element often impacts on the others.

Rising populations and shrinking households in Europe have both
increased demand for public water supplies. But whereas households are
expected to continue getting smaller, the EU-27 population is projected
to stand roughly at today's level 50 years from now.

The relationship between income growth and public water use is more
ambiguous. At low levels of national income, water use normally expands
rapidly in response to rising earnings and standards of living. As
countries become richer, however, households tend to become fully
equipped with domestic appliances and the economy may shift away from
water-intensive industries, meaning that demand flattens.

Technological developments also play a role, with improvements in
appliances such as washing machines bringing large reductions in water
use. The most efficient dishwashers, for instance, now use less water
than washing by hand. At the same time, changes in lifestyle and
habits, such as the desire for a green lawn during summer, can boost
household water use. And, as noted above, tourism can impose huge extra
demands on public water supplies not least because tourists typically
use between two and five times more water than locals.

Opportunities for sustainable water
management

With so much influencing public water demand, policies to reduce
water use must clearly be multifaceted and responsive to local needs,
while delivering the best possible economic and social outcomes.
Encouragingly, research indicates where governments and citizens should
focus their efforts.

First, water pricing and metering have been highly effective in
changing consumer behaviour in many countries. In England and Wales,
for example, people living in metered properties use, on average, 13 %
less water than those in unmetered homes.

Shifting to modern domestic appliances or adapting existing ones
can have a huge impact. Toilet flushing alone accounts for 25–30 % of
domestic water use and simple fixes such as toilet 'hippos' can
radically lower flush volumes.

Investing in detecting and repairing leaks from public water
systems is also important. In Denmark, for example, loss from leakage
has fallen from more than 10 % in 1996 to 6–7 %.

Raising awareness via education, information campaigns and
eco-labelling schemes can play a crucial role in changing habits and
lifestyles. In the context of tending gardens or irrigating golf
courses, education facilitates the introduction of drought‑tolerant
species and techniques to retain soil moisture, thereby reducing water
demand.

The European Commission recommends that once countries have
exhausted measures to reduce water use and increase efficiency they
should consider drawing on non-traditional water sources, provided they
are sustainable. Harvesting rainwater and reusing greywater (household
wastewater other than that from toilets) to water gardens and flush
toilets are two such sources that can significantly lower demand for
public water.

In Cyprus, for example, a government-subsidised scheme to reuse
greywater reduced per capita water consumption by up to 40 %. At a
resort in Corsica, meanwhile, effluent is subject to lagooning and
tertiary treatment by sand filtration before being used to irrigate the
neighbouring golf course.

Adopting such practices more widely may allow regions like the Júcar
both to guarantee sufficient water supplies and continue reaping the
economic benefits of golf course development for years to come: good
news for local people, water resource managers and visiting golfers
alike.